San Diego Bay is now home to troop transports that have masts shaped like huge traffic cones. They’re docked near quasi-frigates that resemble lawn darts. And room is being made for a huge destroyer whose design is unlike anything seen since the Civil War.

Navy Town, aka San Diego, is getting a makeover.

In the endless effort to prepare for the next war or skirmish, the Navy is spending tens of billions of dollars to modernize its fleet. Far-reaching change is under way, involving everything from the Navy’s ability to search for mines in shallow, nearshore waters to projecting Marines ashore on distant beaches.

San Diego is at the center of the transformation, as it has been many times in the past. The makeover is being sparked in part by the “Pacific Pivot,” the Pentagon’s term for placing greater numbers of modern warships on the West Coast, where they can rapidly respond to any troubles and other demands in the Asia-Pacific region.

Since spring 2010, nine new warships have been assigned to San Diego. At least seven more will arrive in the next four years, including the Zumwalt and the Michael Monsoor, which will be the two largest destroyers in Navy history.

The influx also will include the first eight littoral combat ships, a controversial and as yet unproved replacement for frigates and minesweepers. They’ll share the bay with America, a next-generation amphibious assault carrier expected to arrive this fall.

The 16 ships cost about $20 billion to build, an investment that’s being augmented by San Diego’s private defense industry.

General Dynamics-NASSCO has been building Mobile Landing Platform vessels, a new type of Navy auxiliary ship that will serve as an offshore staging base for amphibious forces. General Atomics is working on a ship-borne electromagnetic rail gun designed to fire projectiles upward of 100 miles. And Northrop Grumman is developing the Fire Scout unmanned helicopter, an aircraft that would be carried by ships.

The transformation has been in the planning for years but has taken on fresh importance due to international politics.

“Every day, in places like the Koreas, the South China Sea and the East China Sea, our allies are facing real threats to their sovereignty and to the peaceful status quo,” says Eric Wertheim, a defense analyst and author of the U.S. Naval Institute Guide to Combat Fleets of the World.

“San Diego will play an ever-increasing role because it has such a wide array of assets,” he added. “It’s the Navy’s West Coast anchor for responding to crises throughout the Pacific.”

Ships of the future

San Diego has been a testing ground for new naval technologies for about a century, something that will be clearly evident in the next few years as the Navy introduces a variety of vessels.

The Coronado, which is advanced like other littoral combat ships doesn't resemble traditional superstructured ships.
— John Gastaldo / John Gastaldo/U-T San Diego

The Coronado, which is advanced like other littoral combat ships doesn't resemble traditional superstructured ships.
— John Gastaldo / John Gastaldo/U-T San Diego

Littoral combat ships: These vessels, also called LCS, were designed to be a comparatively inexpensive replacement for frigates, minesweepers and patrol boats. The Navy contracted with industry for two classes of LCS — a monohull that looks like a patrol ship on steroids, and the Independence, a trimaran whose long bow and flared after-section makes it resemble a lawn dart.

Both models were designed as high-speed, shallow-draft ships capable of taking on equipment for narrowly defined missions, some involving special-forces troops.

Originally, the Navy planned to have 55 littoral ships, a figure that slipped to 52 early on. The expectation was that LCS would come to represent about one-sixth of a 305-ship naval fleet.

San Diego is home to four littoral ships, and another four are on the way. But the future of the program is fuzzy.

In February, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel cut the number of planned littorals by 20 because of concerns about the soaring costs of the program and the belief that these ships are too fragile to take a hard punch in combat.

Government analysts and bipartisan groups of lawmakers in Congress have gone further, saying the LCS is too lightly armed, complicated to operate, sometimes unstable and not very durable. More concerns arose last year when the Freedom experienced various operational problems after it deployed to Singapore from San Diego.

Hagel has told the Navy to consider building a more “lethal” version of the LCS or an entire new generation of frigates, an order that could further change the mix of vessels in San Diego Bay, which has more surface ships than the entire British Royal Navy.

The LCS program has its supporters, including Peter Daly, a retired vice admiral who is now chief executive of the U.S. Naval Institute, an independent think tank in Annapolis, Md.

“There’s a case to be made that LCS is a good fit for some of its missions,” Daly said. “The remote mine-countermeasure package on LCS is coming together well. We should be past the days when we send a manned ship into a minefield. So, yes, LCS is definitely a step forward for certain missions.”

Amphibious warships: The Navy has aggressively moved to improve its ability to deploy Camp Pendleton-based Marines, home-porting five new San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock ships in San Diego, including the recently arrived Somerset.

Congress is considering funds for a sixth of these ships, and it’s likely to be home-ported here as well.

The vessels are more than 130 feet longer than the ones they replace, providing greater space for vehicles and landing craft. The new ships also have a stealthier design, which includes a pair of distinctive 93-foot-tall hexagonal masts that hide sensors and antennas.

This fall, the Marines plan to gain more air and fire support with the arrival of America, the next-generation amphibious ship. The 844-foot America doesn’t have a floodable well deck for handling hover and landing craft. That space was largely devoted to aviation.

America will be able to carry two more aircraft than traditional amphibious ships, which will allow for increased ground support during troop movements. Its air wing will eventually include six Joint Strike Fighters, the newest fighter jet in the country’s inventory.

Analysts will be watching to see if America truly fulfills the Navy’s vision. Previous generations of amphibious warships have encountered problems, including the San Diego-based Tarawa, which analysts said suffered from trying to squeeze too many functions into one vessel.

There’s also an emotional changing-of-the-guard just ahead.

America will replace the Peleliu, the legendary San Diego-based amphibious ship that put the first Marines into Afghanistan during Operation Enduring Freedom.

The Peleliu also helped to evacuate thousands of people from the Philippines after Mount Pinatubo erupted in 1991.

The USS Zumwalt (DDG 1000), the first of the Zumwalt-class guided-missile destroyers, is floated out of dry dock at the General Dynamics Bath Iron Works shipyard in Maine. The Zumwalt is scheduled to be commissioned in 2016 and sent to San Diego. U.S. Navy/General Dynamics

The USS Zumwalt (DDG 1000), the first of the Zumwalt-class guided-missile destroyers, is floated out of dry dock at the General Dynamics Bath Iron Works shipyard in Maine. The Zumwalt is scheduled to be commissioned in 2016 and sent to San Diego. U.S. Navy/General Dynamics

Zumwalt destroyers: Many peculiar Navy vessels have operated out of San Diego, including the experimental stealth ship Sea Shadow. It looked like a metal sea gull trying to take flight. But it wasn’t as peculiar as the Zumwalt, a new type of destroyer scheduled to arrive in 2016.

The Zumwalt could be mistaken for a submarine; it’s long, thin and capped with a deckhouse that’s similar to the sail on submarines. The ship also resembles the Monitor, the low-profile Union Navy ironclad that fought in the American Civil War.

Such comparisons aren’t out of place. The 600-foot Zumwalt is a powerful, stealthy destroyer designed for land attacks and air and sea defense. It will stock an assortment of missiles, including long-range Tomahawks. It also will feature a pair of high-speed 155 mm guns that can fire munitions up to 65 miles away.

The Zumwalt is the first Navy surface ship with all-electric propulsion, a system designed to divert energy for the Navy’s electromagnetic railguns and lasers that are now in development.

Norman Friedman, a prominent naval analyst and futurist, doubts the ship will be as stealthy as advertised. But he also said: “If they can get the rail gun on that ship, it’d be a very big deal.”

The Navy plans to build three Zumwalt-class destroyers, all of them slated to be home-ported in San Diego.

Navy Town

The new ships that have been arriving, and will soon arrive, in San Diego represent a deep symbiotic relationship between the city and Navy that goes back more than a century — to a time when the region was known for lovely weather and little else.

Civic leaders were desperate to establish a thriving economy, leading them to promote San Diego as the “Gibraltar of the Pacific,” a phrase that also has been used to promote Hawaii.

Politicians focused on bringing the Navy to San Diego, largely by trumpeting the bay as one of the greatest natural harbors in North America. Their campaign was filled with hyperbole: Early on, the harbor had a narrow, shallow channel that was dotted with shoals, making navigation hazardous.

But the city also offered the Navy lots of property at little or no cost. This incentive, along with a realization of San Diego’s strategic value, gradually led the Navy to establish what is now the largest naval complex on the West Coast.

Historians said the city and the Navy grew up together, a relationship so mutually beneficial in the 1930s that locally stationed admirals aggressively lobbied the government to dredge San Diego Bay.

That relationship has produced what some call a “martial metropolis.”

The San Diego Military Affairs Council estimates that the military directly contributes $24.5 billion to the county’s economy each year. The majority of that money is tied to the Navy, which owns San Clemente Island, its only remaining live-fire shore bombardment range. The island also is used for training. The Higgins boat landing craft used in World War II was partially developed at San Clemente Island.

The proximity of Camp Pendleton enhances the amphibious-training options.

In addition, the sea and air space off San Diego has an underwater training range for submarines, surface and air training areas, and specialty training for electronic warfare and other missions.

North Island Naval Air Station provides a strategic landing option for aviators training offshore when they can’t land on ships at sea.

All of these options allow the Navy to “work up” its aircraft carrier strike groups and amphibious ready groups for operations in the western Pacific and beyond.

“San Diego is well-positioned to avoid reductions and realize gains,” said Daly, the admiral, who formerly commanded the Nimitz Strike Group. “The port is incredible, and its integrated network of operational training ranges is a premier capability unmatched anywhere else.”